The Kids Are Alright
by White N Nerdy
Summary: A little Greg story—emphasis on the “little” Greg—as he deals with the pressures of private school, bullies, cowardly friends, nosebleeds, oh, and of course his mother...
1. Greg has an Ingenious Plan

**The Kids Are Alright**

_Rated T for language and bullying related violence._

**Foreword**

Another little Greg story—ha, get it…_little _Greg—featuring his mother. Super special thanks to everybody who enjoyed my three shots in "The Real Greg Sanders"—it means a lot :)

This particular story is quite different (and very random) and happens to take place in the late '80s, a time period that I know nothing about because I grew up in the '90s. But hopefully this is something you guys weren't really expecting…in a good way. If that makes any sense. And I apologize for not posting this as quickly as I thought I would. It's been more difficult to write and edit than I initially thought it would be. School's started again, so I figured if I don't start posting this now before things get really hectic then I never will.

Anywho…on with the story…

**Chapter I: Greg has an Ingenious Plan**

"This is it you guys…I'm _totally_ going in."

"I dunno, this really doesn't sound like a great idea…"

"Yeah, man. Maybe we should just abort."

"You guys are kidding me with this, right?"

"It's really not a good idea…"

"You're most definitely gonna get your butt kicked."

"Okay, that's enough from you negative nancies," the smallest but loudest of the trio yelled with a slight, braces induced lisp and a shake of his tousled brown hair. "Nobody kicks Greg Sanders' butt and gets away with it!"

"Uh, sure they do, Greg," one of his friends pointed out in a slightly cracking voice. This boy towered over his two friends, and might have looked imposing if not for his stick thin, hunched over form and thick rimmed glasses that magnified his nervous, constantly darting eyes. "Quite often, actually…"

"Yeah like last week," the other added with a snort as he absentmindedly blew blonde bangs away from his eyes. The bowl cut was a very unflattering look, for this boy in particular as it only accentuated his overly round face and body. "Marty Geisman gave you a monster wedgie for _lookin'_ at him funny."

Greg rolled his eyes at his friends' overwhelming lack of support. "Marty Geisman just caught me off guard last week, that's all."

"_Just_ last week?" the blonde boy scoffed. "Don't you mean like _every_ week?"

"Well at least I didn't get my _fat _head stuffed down a toilet," Greg growled back.

He glared at his so called friend, and for a moment the two looked ready for fisticuffs before the third—who was definitely the cowardly pacifist of the trio—intervened and changed the subject back to the point at hand.

"You know Greg, those kids are a heck of lot bigger than Marty Geisman," he said as he adjusted his glasses slightly. He glanced over towards the fence at the edge of school property where the kids in question were currently standing. "Older, too…they look like they're probably eighth graders…"

"_Exactly_," Greg exclaimed, completely forgetting about the argument he was having as his brilliant plan became the subject of their conversation again. "If Marty Geisman sees us hanging around with kids like that he's gotta leave us alone, right?"

His friends glanced nervously at each other. Clearly they were still unconvinced.

"How do you guys not think this is the most awesomest ingenious plan I've ever come up with?!" Greg groaned in frustration. "Look at it this way—sure Marty Geisman's big and mean, but he still goes to nerd school like us. Those guys over there look even bigger and meaner, _and _they go to the public school. That bully asshole Marty Geisman wouldn't even stand a chance with them around us."

His bespectacled friend winced slightly and made a nervous tsking sound in the back of his throat. "Greeeggg," he warned. "My mom says you're not supposed to say swear words..."

Greg gaped in muted horror while his blonde friend let out a high pitched squeal of laughter and fell back onto the dirt. "You tattled on Greg to your _mom_?!"

The taller boy just shrugged as a humiliated blush grew on his cheeks. "Well…I kinda…said something at home," he admitted. "It just slipped, but she asked me where I heard it so…"

"So you told on me?!" All the color left young Greg's face as another thought popped into his head. "Your mom didn't tell _my_ mom, did she?"

"Uh…no, I don't think so…"

Greg sighed heavily in relief. "Oh, thank _God_. She would have freaked out…"

The portly boy ceased his giggling and sat up immediately with a somewhat panicked expression on his reddened face. "Wait—isn't your mom picking us up today?"

Greg nodded. "Uh, yeah, I think so."

"Okay, then nobody can say any swear words or anything about anybody saying swear words," the blonde said sternly. "If we do, she'll _definitely_ tell on us."

"No she won't," Greg muttered defensively.

"Are you crazy, Greg?! Yes she will—your mom's like the biggest tattle tale ever." He nodded to the taller boy as he continued, saying, "not like your mom. Your mom's cool."

"Oh, thanks, I guess…"

"Hey, my mom's cool, too," Greg pouted, feeling for some reason like he should stick up for his over protective mother.

"No she's not, she's crazy!"

"Yeah, Greg. You're mom is pretty crazy…"

Greg felt his ears burn in embarrassment over the talk of his mother. He wasn't sure if he should continue to defend her and risk the chance of losing the few friends he'd managed to make and keep at school over the years or if he should agree with them and make a mockery of his own mother. He opted for doing neither.

"Whatever," he muttered. "Can we just get back to the plan now before our ride gets here?"

"What plan?"

Greg felt his temper rising as he growled through gritted teeth, "the _plan_ where we go over _there_ and make _bigger_ friends. The plan I've been trying to explain to you guys for like _two weeks _now."

"Ohhh. _That_ plan."

"Yes 'that plan.' So come on, ramblers," Greg said. "Let's get rambling."

They gave him funny looks.

"Ramble on? Get it?"

"Greg we know what _ramble _is," the blonde said snootily. "We're better at vocabulary than you, remember?"

"That's not what—oh, never mind," Greg mumbled under his breath as he recalled his friends' lack of musical taste. "So come on, let's go over there already."

But still neither of them moved. Greg turned to look at the group of teenage boys on the other side of the field, suddenly a little unnerved by the prospect of speaking to them alone. "Do I really have to go by myself?"

Both of his friends frantically nodded their heads.

"It was your idea, Greg," the blonde stated.

"Yeah, and just for the record, I'm fine with having Marty Geisman bully me around," the other, even more cowardly boy added. "My mom even gives me more lunch money now."

Greg stared at them for a long moment, hoping they would give in under his scrutinizing glare. They didn't, so he finally sighed in defeat. "Fine. But don't come crawling back to me when I have anti-bully friends and you guys don't."

Greg stuck his tongue out at them and pushed himself to his feet, wiping the grass and flecks of dirt off his school uniform as he did so. He hiked up his shorts, puffed out his chest, and took a deep breath. He glanced upwards through the boughs of the tree they were sitting beneath and felt the warm California sun beaming down on him. A wide grin grew on his face as he thought to himself, _Gregory Sanders, you are a genius_.

In fact he could already picture his future in his head—these three, casually dressed, grungy public school kids acting like Greg's body guards while they bore down on Marty Geisman and his asshole friends outside of the school every day. He could just see the looks of absolute horror on their faces when they saw Greg's new cronies. Too bad the older kids were not the kind of friends that Greg would immediately want to introduce to his parents, but who knows, maybe his mom would warm up to them someday…

"So _go_ already."

Greg snapped out of his day dream to glare at his blonde friend. "I _am_ going. Just cool your jets already, geez." He took another deep, calming breath and stepped out of their little shady spot.

This was where the three friends always sat, beneath the safety of a large tree in the center of the long, thin field located on the far side of their private school. Here they were far enough from the road and from the handfuls of other students lingering on the school grounds so that they could wait for their ride home in secluded peace. The wait generally wasn't a long one—twenty minutes at the most depending on whose mom was on carpool duty—but they didn't mind, even when it was cold out. Greg especially enjoyed these brief social times outside of the classroom, as his mother rarely let him hang out with his friends by himself after school or over the weekends.

Greg found it increasingly frustrating as he got older and more sociable with kids his age to have a mother who worried about everything. Literally everything. No sports, no sleepovers, no nothing that she didn't deem completely safe. He didn't know what she was always freaking out about—his friends' moms let them do almost anything they wanted, and they were fine. But as Greg took slow and steady steps across the school yard, he was confident that his bully problem was one thing she wouldn't have to worry about.

Marty Geisman was one of those kids who were sent to private school more for the discipline than for the advanced education. He was in Greg's class, but was at least a year older and grown in height and girth to about twice Greg's size. And he and his other large, dim-witted friends took pleasure in picking on those who were unfortunate enough to not be as tough and cool as they apparently thought they were. So, naturally, Greg and his pair of nerdy cronies were prime targets for their harassing on a daily basis. Greg had hoped that over the summer Marty would have matured from his bully ways, but now, a little over a month into their sixth grade year, the boy showed no signs of easing up on his behavior.

Greg, unable to take the teasing and the taunting anymore, had been on the lookout for some sort of protection from the bullies. He'd learned that he couldn't just tell on them to his mother or the teachers, as that would only make him more susceptible to their cruelty and deem him a "snitch" or a "tattle tale." And Greg couldn't have that, especially as he began his ascent on the school's social ladder.

It was by pure chance that he happened to notice the group of older boys standing just across the field where he and his friends regularly sat. They'd been hanging around for a few weeks now by the far chain link fence that separated the private school grounds from a dense row of trees that Greg knew ended a dozen yards away in the public middle school's baseball field. He didn't know why these public school kids hung out in the back of the private school—they never talked to anyone outside of their own little trio. Maybe they stood there because it was so much nicer and less crowded than their own' school's facilities. Or maybe they just preferred the shade of the trees from this side of the fence.

Whatever the case was, Greg wasn't sure. He knew that the public school was just a block away from Greg's school, but it seemed like such a different place from a distance. The kids wore whatever they wanted, they hung out wherever they wanted, and they all took bright yellow school buses back and forth from school. Greg didn't even have a bus stop on his street. Oh how he longed to take a real school bus and not have his mother drive him back and forth to school…

Before he knew it, Greg was almost to the fence. But each new step that took Greg closer to his destination slowed to a nervous crawl as he began to rethink his brilliant plan. Now that he was closer to them Greg could see that these boys were much bigger than he had thought, and he realized suddenly that he could smell smoke. He wrinkled his nose at the stench in disbelief. He was always warned by adults about the dangers of smoking, and he couldn't fathom how these boys—who couldn't have been more than a few years older than he was—had started up the nasty habit.

Greg swallowed hard against his nerves and stopped a few feet outside of their circle. He was too close now to turn back—surely the older boys would think even less of him if they saw him running away. Greg glanced over his shoulder and saw his two friends watching him eagerly from where they sat. The blonde nodded his head to silently egg him on while the other nervously gnawed on his nails. He turned back to the purpose of his mission, now feeling somewhat reassured by the attention he was getting.

He hadn't realized until now how tall these boys were. He had to crane his neck just to see their faces and the puffs of smoke that rose up from their mouths. Greg coughed from the thickness in the air and they finally turned to acknowledge his existence. And as they found the source of the noise and glared down at the small intruder, they looked less than enthused by his presence.

"What the hell do you want, _twerp_?" The largest of them asked as he dragged on his cigarette.

Greg shuffled his feet while he let out a short, obviously nervous chuckle. "Ha, 'twerp'—like I haven't heard _that _one before." He grinned up at the older boys, who glared back at him. He cleared his throat and wished the feeling of drunken butterflies dancing in his stomach would go away. "So, uh…what's up, guys? …I mean hanging—what's hanging? H-hanging out by the fence, I see… Well that's fun…cool…that's cool… I like hanging out, also… I'm Greg, by the way…"

He put his hand out first to shake hands with them, but they did not move to return the gesture. With an audible gulp and a very forced smile, Greg casually moved his hand to instead lean casually against the fence. The rusted chain links wobbled unsteadily even under his light weight so he quickly amended his mistake and stood straight again, opting for burying his now slightly shaking hands deep in his pockets. The three older boys continued to stare down at him like he was nothing more than a revolting insect.

"Ah, anywho," Greg continued, the pitch of his voice rising with his nerves. "I just wanted to, ya know, hang out with you guys and stuff."

"Why," the biggest boy—who must have been the leader—growled not as a question, but as a demand.

Greg swallowed hard. "Um, well, it-it's just 'cause you guys are always…over here…" he gestured to the fence "…and me and my guys are always…over there…" with his free hand he pointed back to his friends, who frantically shook their heads and looked away to avoid any involvement in what they considered to be Greg's very idiotic plan. "So I thought maybe we could hang out…somewhere in the middle…together...I guess…" He brought his hands together and folded them all the while grinning timidly up at the bullies that he'd hoped would save him from his own bully problems. "…maybe?"

A look of amusement crossed the older boys' faces simultaneously, but their smiles only sent chills down Greg's spine. Now he was not only a tiny, insignificant insect to them, but he was an insect that was just standing there begging to be squished, or set fire to, or torn meticulously to pieces.

Greg paled at their expressions and took an unsteady step backwards, almost tripping clumsily over his own feet as he did so. He looked down and noticed numbly that one of his shoe's laces were untied while he muttered, "uhh, actually…never mind…I'm sorry I, um, bothered you fellows. I'm just gonna…go now…"

Greg glanced up again just in time to see the leader of the three pulled his massive fist back. Greg's eyes widened in surprise and he was barely able to mutter a small "oh, crap" before pain exploded on his face and everything turned black.


	2. Greg gets a Nosebleed

**Chapter II: Greg gets a Nosebleed**

And then something was poking at him, so Greg moaned at it to go away.

"Greg, come on man," a familiar voice was saying with urgency. "Your mom like _just_ got here. We gotta go…"

"My…my m-mom?!" Greg started in a stuffy voice.

He shot to attention and forced his stinging eyes open. Everything was fuzzy and his head swam for a disorienting moment, but he could just make out his two friends standing over him with distinct we-told-you-so looks on their faces. Greg tried to get up, he really did, but everything felt suddenly very heavy where he lay on his back in the dirt. He felt something warm and sticky falling down the front of his face and realized with horror that his nose was bleeding rather profusely. The fear intensified when he heard another familiar voice, this one coming from some distance away on the side of the road.

"Gregory!" his mother called from her boxy blue minivan, sounding anxious already. "What is going on over there?"

The public school boys that had caused Greg's bloody nose sniggered cruelly as they walked further away along the perimeter of the fence. Greg's face flushed with embarrassment and he silently cursed himself, wondering why he'd thought talking to them would be a good idea in the first place. But as humiliating as it was to be punched out and laughed at in front of his friends and classmates, he knew he definitely did not want to be seen like this by his mother.

"Gregory!" She'd gotten out of her car and was walking towards the boys, waving her arms dramatically to get her son's attention.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no…" He pushed himself quickly into a sitting position, swaying slightly because of the sudden heaviness in his head and the strong smell of his own blood. He swiped under his nose with his sleeve. There wasn't a lot of blood, but still—he knew from experience that it didn't take much for his to get mom worked up. "Crap crap crap," he hissed as he tried to staunch the bleeding by pinching his nostrils shut. "You guys stall her or something!"

His friends blinked at him in confusion. "What should we do?"

Greg leapt to his feet and brushed the dust off his shorts and closed his jacket to hide the blood that had dribbled onto his white button down shirt. "I don't care, do anything, do _something_—"

"What are you boys doing over there on the ground?" Greg's mother called as she approached the trio. "I hope you're not getting your uniforms dirty…"

"Oh, h-hey Mrs. Sanders," the taller of the boys stuttered nervously with a short wave as he pointedly stepped in front of Greg. "How are you doing today?"

"Lovely day, isn't it?" the other added with an obviously forced bright smile. "Isn't it nice out today, Mrs. Sanders?"

The middle aged woman raised a suspicious eyebrow but was not so easily distracted as she dodged her son's friends to see her own boy standing behind them with a wide, innocent grin on his face.

"Gregory, what are you—" She stopped mid step with a horrified gasp and exclaimed, "oh my God, is that blood?!"

"What? Where's blood?" Greg said absentmindedly, his smile fading as he felt warm liquid gathering in his nostrils again. He sniffled. "Ma, I don't see any blood—we're fine. We're all fine. Everything's fine here. See? So let's go…"

He tried to pass her, about to make a beeline for the back seat of her minivan, when she suddenly grasped at her son's navy blazer, indicating the dark stain on his sleeve. Then she looked back at his face and noticed the blood that was just starting to run down from his nose. He sniffled again and winced ever so slightly.

You'd think he'd gotten his face beaten to a bloody pulp—her reaction probably would have been about the same.

"Oh my God," she shrieked again as she suddenly took his face into her gentle hands. "Gregory your nose…what happened to you?!"

"Nothing, ma," Greg insisted as he tried in vain to pull away from her grasp. "It's just a nosebleed…"

"'_Just_ a nosebleed'?!" she cried while she turned Greg's head back to look more carefully at the wound. "You could have broken something…you might have a…a deviated spectrum!"

Greg's friends hid their snickering behind their hands while he muttered stuffily, "you mean septum, ma…deviated _septum_…"

If she heard the correction, she didn't acknowledge it as she suddenly pulled an obnoxiously large wad of tissues from her coat pocket and held it beneath her son's nostrils. "Hold that there," she said in a shaky voice. "There's just so much _blood_…"

Greg reluctantly held the tissues to his face. A small crowd was starting to gather at his mother's exclamations and Greg couldn't believe how many students and faculty were still hanging around outside after school had ended.

"I'm okay, really," he muttered in an almost pleading voice. "Can we _please _just go now?"

"Yes definitely," she exclaimed. She put one arm around her son's shoulders while her free hand held the tissues to Greg's face when he was apparently not doing it correctly. She rushed him to her car while his friends followed cautiously, wondering how their afternoon carpool would be affected by this unforeseen turn of events.

"Come on boys," she said as she pulled open the sliding door. "Hurry, hurry, hurry!"

Once they were in the car and Greg was buckled securely in the front passenger seat, she took off from the side of the road in front of the school. The boys all looked slightly alarmed by her speeding, and then even more so when they realized she was going in the opposite direction of their San Gabriel homes.

"Sorry, kids," she said when she caught their confounded expressions in her rearview mirror. "We're going to have to make a little stop before I can take you home."

Greg did not like the sound of that. Not at all. He glanced out the window and happened to notice that she was being directed by a number of blue signs on the side of the road. Signs with a big white "H" on them. Greg suddenly realized with horror where they were going.

"_Mom_," he whined. "I don't need the hospital! I told you I'm _fine_!"

* * *

"…Your son is _fine_, Mrs. Sanders," a doctor in sea green scrubs insisted for the dozenth time at least. His tone was steady, but he looked very close to losing his patience with the older woman. "It's just a common, anterior nosebleed. Trust me when I tell you there's absolutely nothing to worry about."

"But are you _sure_?" she asked desperately. "What if he broke something? Did you take any x-rays? Maybe he should get some x-rays…"

The doctor sighed heavily. "Gregory doesn't need any x-rays. He doesn't even need that gauze anymore—the bleeding's stopped completely."

At that Greg lifted his hung head and hopped off of the examination table, leaving the barely bloodied wad of gauze behind him. "See, I _told_ you I was fine," he muttered to his mother, his face still scarlet with embarrassment at having been rushed to the ER in the first place. "Can we go now? _Please_?"

She stared at him, obviously torn between staying as her instincts told her and leaving as the more rational doctor instructed. She still looked anxious, even when she finally gave in and sighed, "alright, Gregory. Let's go home."

Greg had every intention of sprinting out of the hospital as quickly as he could, but was stopped before he could even reach the room's doorway by the sound of his mother pointedly clearing her throat. He raised an eyebrow at her, so she ahemmed again and nodded towards the doctor. Greg got the hint immediately.

"Oh, thanks a bunch, doc," he said, doubling back to shake the man's hand. "Sorry we, uh, wasted your time…"

"_Gregory_!"

"Well we did," the boy murmured sheepishly.

"Thank you, doctor," Greg's mother said after glaring at her son. "Hopefully something like this will never happen again."

"Yes, hopefully," the doctor replied monotonically. "But seriously, Mrs. Sanders—you don't need to take your son to the hospital the next time he has something as simple as a nosebleed. Just pinch his nose to clot the blood, and make sure to keep his head tilted forward. If the bleeding doesn't stop for at least half an hour, _then_ you can rush to the ER and potentially waste my time."

She nodded stiffly and forced a smile at the condescending doctor before steering her son out of the room. They were almost in the hallway when the doctor's voice stopped them again.

"And Greg?"

Greg and his mother turned simultaneously to look back at the doctor with bewildered expressions.

The doctor nodded to Greg's sneakers. "I'd tie those laces if I were you. That's probably why you fell down and hurt yourself in the first place."

Greg looked sheepishly at his feet. "Oh, yeah," he mumbled while he quickly crouched down to tie his shoe laces. "_That's _why I fell…"

He got to his feet but didn't even look at his mother or the doctor, the latter of whom was suddenly eying him suspiciously.

"Thank you again, doctor," Mrs. Sanders said as she straightened her son's jacket and led him away from the examination room.

"See, I _told_ you I was fine," Greg hissed up at her.

"That's enough, Gregory."

She kept her hands on his shoulders as she led him forcefully past the more seriously injured and sick people until they were back into the lobby of the hospital. Greg quickly studied every head in the crowded waiting room but did not see the familiar faces of his two comrades. "Where're the guys?"

She blinked down at him. "Who?"

"My _friends_, ma…"

"Oh. Well, I called Michael's mom when we arrived so she must have come to pick them up while we were waiting for the doctor to see you." Greg looked immensely disappointed by this, so his mother quickly added, "I'm sure your friends wish you well."

Soon they were in the parking lot, and when Greg moved to open the front door of the van again his mother shook her head and explained that the seat was "for emergencies only." Greg reluctantly crawled into the back and kept his pouting gaze out the window for the entire ride home.

By the time they reached the quiet, residential block where the Sanders' lived the sky was tinted a deep blue with pale streaks of red and purple as the sun finished setting. Mrs. Sanders pulled into the driveway of a two story, pristine white home adorned with burgundy shutters and a clean cut front yard that pointedly did not match the rest of the town's more Southern style architecture.

The minivan came to a stop in front of the garage and she turned the engine off but did not immediately move to get out of the car. Greg, meanwhile, had his seatbelt off the minute his house was in sight. His hand was on the door handle, ready to leap out and book it to the front door as soon as humanly possible. When the car stopped completely he pulled on the door, but it wouldn't budge.

"_Mom_," he whined from the back seat. "The child safety whatever locks are on…you gotta let me out from outside." When she didn't move to assist him right away, he whined even louder. "Come _on_…"

"Just a minute, Gregory," she started in a low and very serious toned voice. "We need to talk about something."

Greg's face blanched as he slowly returned to his seat with an audible gulp. She only spoke like this to him when he was in trouble. He knew from experience that his mother wasn't a yeller—she was a worrier and a shrieker, sure, but when she got really mad or upset her voice would drop an octave and she would look at him with immense disappointment in her eyes. Greg hated that look.

"Whatever it is you think I did, I didn't do it…probably," he blurted quickly. "You can't be mad at me if I didn't do anything…"

She turned around to look at him with her soft brown eyes. "I'm not mad, Gregory."

He breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, cool. So…can we go now?"

"No."

"Aww, man," he muttered.

"I'm not mad," she said again, still with that thick tone. "But I am upset. I want you tell me the truth about what happened after school today."

He shifted nervously in his seat and looked pointedly at his feet. Greg was never very good at lying directly to his mother's face. "No, really—it's like I told the doc. I just tripped and hit my nose on a…in the dirt. My shoe laces were untied, remember?"

"I know you didn't fall down, Gregory," she said matter-of-factly. "I saw those bigger boys laughing at you, honey. If someone's picking on you, you can tell me."

He'd never told his mother about Marty Geisman teasing him before, out of fear that she would overreact. She was a tattle tale, after all. If she called the school about the bully and got him in trouble, that wouldn't benefit Greg at all. He had to see the kid and his friends in school every day after all. But then again…these public boys were obviously a lot meaner than Marty Geisman, and they weren't even students at Greg's school. So what would the harm be in getting them in trouble?

He let out a frustrated groan as he finally gave in to his internal debate. "It's nothing, mom. Those kids don't even go to my school, they just hang out by the fence in the back."

"'Hang out'?"

"Yeah, you know—they just stand there and stuff."

"How are they allowed to loiter there if they don't go to your school?"

Greg shrugged. "I dunno. But they do anyway." And just to seal their fate, Greg added, "they smoke too!"

His mother looked predictably horrified. "Do you know these boys' names?"

He shook his head.

"Hmm," she said, her brows furrowed as she looked thoughtful for a long moment before finally turning to get out of the car. "Thank you for telling me the truth, Gregory."

* * *

_Wow thanks a bunch to the-amazing-lyndz, happyharper13, fox-rox1539, JantyChick, and Seshat3 for your kind, encouraging reviews :) I've come to realize that my stories aren't exactly, uh, review magnets or anything, but I'm cool with knowing at least a handful of people care. So thanks :)_

_Expect weekly updates for the remaining three chapters. I'm pretty much done with the story—it's mostly editing and filler crap that I have to worry about right now—but with school and stuff it's probably best if I try to stick to once a week updates._


	3. Greg and his Mommy

**Chapter III: Greg and his Mommy**

"Ahh, home sweet home," Greg exclaimed loudly as he entered the foyer of his family's upper middle class California home. His mother helped him out of his blazer, all the while tsking and complaining under her breath about all the work she would have to do to get the blood out of the uniform for school the next day.

Greg, as soon as he was free of his jacket, raced through the living room towards the kitchen and dining room, then back around to the front hall before his mother had even started ascending the stairs.

"Where's dad?" he asked breathlessly when his swift search had revealed nothing.

His mother sighed heavily and shook her head. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. Dad's working late tonight."

"_Again_?" Greg whined.

"I'm afraid so." She climbed a few steps and Greg was quick to follow.

"Well what's he doin' that he's gotta work so late all the time?"

"Your father's a busy man, you know that Gregory," she answered in a noticeably forced steady tone. "He has a lot of people who count on him and his work."

"Oh," Greg muttered, though her answer didn't really satisfy his question.

"Do you have much homework to do tonight?" Mrs. Sanders asked as she pointedly changed the subject.

Greg shrugged. "Not really."

"That's good. Maybe you could help me with this laundry, and then with dinner tonight—"

She stopped mid-thought when she heard a door slam loudly behind her. As soon as they'd reached the top of the stairs Greg had dashed off to his bedroom, apparently not overly eager to help her with any chores or cooking. She sighed and stared at his closed door, with its bright yellow customized biohazard sign bearing the words "Greg's Laboratory" staring back at her. She only hoped he wasn't doing anything too dangerous in there. He'd already set fire to his room twice before, giving her every reason to freak out whenever he closed himself in his own personal Fortress of Solitude. But it seemed there was nothing she or anyone could do to keep the boy from his precious chemistry set. If only he was as enthusiastic about the rest of his subjects in school.

She wasn't even sure where he had developed his passionate interest in science—certainly not from his family. She was good with arts and crafts, but that was about it. She couldn't even name a single element in the Periodic Table, while her eleven year son could already rattle off the whole thing in a matter of minutes. Her parents—who immigrated to the US from Norway when they were teenagers due to a _mistake_ that led to the birth of her eldest brother—were also unknowledgeable in the scientific field.

Greg's father, the man she had fallen in love with so many years ago, had no interest in the sciences either. In fact it seemed he had little interest in his son overall. It was rare that Mr. Sanders was home in time for dinner anymore, and even when he was home at a decent hour he would always shut himself in his office to do work related things.

It bothered her immensely, but there was nothing she could do or say to keep him from his work. She hadn't been lying when she said her husband was a very busy man—she just wished his empty promises and excuses weren't said as often or as easily as they were.

She shook her head to dismiss the thoughts of her husband and turned her attention back to the task at hand. She left Greg's stained jacket hanging on the stair railing and strolled into her bedroom. She only needed to think for a second before grabbing the telephone and dialing a number that she knew by heart. It was answered after three rings.

"Hello, Mr. Kane? This is Gregory Sanders' mother." She ignored the principal's groan on the other line and continued. "I need to speak with you about something that happened after school today…"

* * *

Now Mrs. Sanders knew she was a good cook—a _damn_ good cook—but for whatever reason Greg was content with just poking absentmindedly at his meal without actually eating any of it. He was slumped down in his chair with a scowl on his face as he stared blankly ahead at nothing.

"Gregory, please sit up at the table. It's rude to slouch."

Greg groaned and shoved himself up in his seat but did not look away from his plate. He put his elbows on the table and leaned his head heavily into one hand while the other continued to fiddle with his fork. His mother had half a mind to chastise him again for the way he was sitting, but she could clearly see that Greg was not acting out or deliberately trying to disobey her rules for proper table etiquette. No, he was distracted—his mind miles away along with his appetite. And she just happened to know exactly what would get Greg out of his funk.

"Oh, Gregory," she said loudly after clearing her throat to get his attention. "I almost forgot to tell you. I spoke with Papa and Nana Olaff this morning. They're definitely coming to visit us next week."

Greg perked up immediately. "Really?"

She nodded. "Yes. They'll be staying for a whole ten days, so I need your help to make sure the house is cleaned and the guest room is ready for them."

"Okay!" Greg exclaimed, and she couldn't help but smile at the excited grin on her young son's face.

"But you know what I need you to do first?"

"What?"

"Take your elbows off the table and eat your food."

"Okay…" Greg said again, though this time without as much enthusiasm. But the grin was still on his face while he shoveled down his meal.

He finished quickly after that, and she was just about to ask him to help her carry the dishes into the kitchen when she was suddenly interrupted by the distinct sound of a car door closing outside and footsteps coming up the front walkway. Greg turned his head immediately at the sound and his smile grew impossibly wider.

"Dad's home!" he exclaimed as he shot up from his seat and bolted from the dining room.

Mrs. Sanders sighed heavily and watched her son go before finally pushing herself up from her seat. She just didn't have the energy to even pretend to be excited for husband's arrival anymore.

She approached the hall just in time to see him enter the front door where an eager Greg was waiting. Mr. Sanders looked down at the boy in surprise, but not a pleasant kind of surprise. An almost annoyed look briefly crossed his face and Mrs. Sanders pursed her lips in disappointment at him. But the expressions on both parents' faces were unseen by Greg, who quickly bombarded his father with his mouth moving a mile a minute.

"Dad, hey dad! Guess what I learned about in school today!"

"What's that, kiddo?" the man mumbled distractedly as he hung his coat in the closet next to the door.

"We learned about the ocean and stuff. Did you know that the moon makes the tides because of gravity and elliptical orbits? Gravity's _sooo_ cool! And then I learned about currents and faults under the ocean and continental shelves and condensation… Hey dad?"

It took a second for him to realize that Greg's abrupt silence meant that he was being addressed. He finally looked down at his young son. "Hmm?"

"Now that I know about the ocean and stuff, can we go sailing again?"

"What?"

"Remember that time we went sailing? Can we go again soon? _Please_…"

"Uh, not this year, Greg."

"But that's what you said _last _year," Greg whined. "And the year before that…"

He crouched down to the boy's eye level and almost sounded genuine when he said, "I'm sorry, kiddo. I've been really busy with work. Maybe we can go next year."

The boy looked back at his father with his best puppy dog pout. Even the tired, middle aged man couldn't resist that look.

"Tell ya what—I'll make it up to you," he said. "We'll go to Disney Land for a weekend. How does that sound?"

"Oh yeah!" Greg exclaimed excitedly as he forgot his disappointment from moments before. "Really dad?"

"Sure," his father chuckled.

Mrs. Sanders cleared her throat, and her husband noticed her standing there for the first time.

"It looks like your mom wants to come, too." He forced another chuckle but did not miss the cold fury in her expression.

"Can we go _this_ weekend, dad?"

"I don't think so. I've gotta work this weekend."

"But—"

Mr. Sanders straightened up again and patted his son on the top of his head, a gesture that concluded his conversation with the boy. Then he moved to greet his wife with a routine peck on her cheek before moving into the kitchen.

"Hey what smells so good?"

"We were just finishing supper," Mrs. Sanders explained.

"Wow, you guys are eating late tonight."

"Yes, we were…a little delayed coming home from school today."

"Why's that?"

She glanced towards Greg, who's Disney Land induced smile was instantly turned upside down. The boy shook his head ever so slightly—clearly he didn't want his father to know about the nosebleed incident. It didn't really matter if she told her husband now or later. He would be seeing the hospital bill soon enough.

Eventually she forced a smile in her spouse's direction. "Oh, there was just a little accident in the school yard this afternoon. It was nothing, really."

"Wait—did something happen to the car?"

Even if she did tell him the outright truth, she wondered if he would care as much as if something had happened to the family minivan. "No," she said with a heavy sigh. "The car's fine."

"Thank God," he muttered. His small family watched as he gathered up a plate of the still warm meal and headed down the hallway with it. "I'm just gonna take this in my office," he said before disappearing into his workspace without even glancing back.

Mrs. Sanders glared at the closed door for a long moment before turning to look at her son, who was being strangely quiet again. The boy had a confused expression on his face, as if he was torn over if he should be upset by his father's rejection or glad that the man was just home before his bed time for once. She put a gentle hand on Greg's shoulder and he blinked up at her.

"Come on, Gregory," she said. "Let's see what's on the television."

He raised a suspicious eyebrow—she _never _let him watch TV this late on a week night.

"Unless you'd rather go straight to bed…"

"Nope," Greg said quickly. "TV sounds good."

And so mother and son made themselves comfortable in front of the family's entertainment system to watch whatever program Mrs. Sanders deemed suitable for her very impressionable eleven year old. While Greg was thoroughly amused and engrossed by whatever cartoon he happened to be watching, she was otherwise distracted by her worrisome thoughts. Their little family was in trouble, no matter how much she tried to dismiss the fact.

Early in the couple's relationship, almost twenty years ago, her husband was just as eager as she was to start a family and settle down, no matter what hardships came their way. But despite their efforts, having a large family was just not meant to be. After three miscarriages and seven years of childless marriage, Mr. Sanders had lost interest in the family life. By the time Greg was born—through some wondrous miracle, she was sure—her husband had invested too much of his time in his business to dote on his only son. His relationship with Greg was littered with broken promises and meaningless gifts, like the Nintendo system he'd given Greg for his tenth birthday, more than a week after the fact. Greg loved the gift, and it effectively distracted him from the fact that his father hadn't been there for him in the first place.

And now this Disney Land promise—she knew it was never going to happen. Greg would get upset that his dad had forgotten about him again and she would have to be there to pick up the pieces. She would never admit it out loud, but she by much preferred the company of her son over her husband. She knew in her heart that she was the only one who could protect Greg and raise him to be a good man so he would not follow in his father's selfish footsteps.

She let Greg stay up until almost nine o'clock before sending him off to bed. She made sure his homework was done and his teeth were brushed, and then made him promise to tell her if anyone bullied him again. He finally muttered his agreement, obviously still embarrassed by the day's earlier events, before crawling beneath his bed sheets.

When she finally turned to her own bedroom, she was surprised to see that her husband was already there. He was sitting on their bed with a stack of papers laid out before him. They were printed with paragraphs of type and charts of numerous geometric shapes, but Mrs. Sanders didn't have a clue what any of it meant. Her husband worked in finances, but that's about all she'd ever managed to grasp from his job description.

He heard her come into the bedroom but didn't look up as he plainly stated, "just so you know, I'm going to be away for most of next week."

She stopped and stared at him. "What? Where are you going?"

"New York," he muttered as though the city was just around the corner rather than on the other side of the country. "Big conference—you wouldn't understand. It's sudden but I have to be there, for the company you know."

Her frown deepened. "When are you leaving?"

"Next Monday. I should be back Saturday, or Sunday. Depends on how busy I am."

"You do remember that my parents are coming over next week, right?"

"Aw, great," he groaned. "I'll make sure I'm gone longer then. Like until after they're gone."

"_Eric_!"

"_What_?" he snapped back. "They're _your_ parents. I don't see why I have to be around while they're here."

Normally she would accept this with no further argument. But his mysterious business trips were happening far too frequently for her to just accept them any longer. "You're _never _around," she finally said in a firm tone. "Not for me…not for our _son_…"

"And I'm sorry for that, I really am," he growled insincerely. "But I don't see how you can expect me to be around all the freaking time. I have to work for a living to support you and all your crap."

"My…_my_..." She couldn't even bring herself to repeat the word. "How dare you," she said stiffly in that thick, disappointed tone of hers. "Do you think it's easy for me? Do you think I enjoy that look of disappointment in our son's eyes when you don't follow through with your promises, or when you don't even come home at a decent hour?"

"I came home tonight, didn't I?"

"Only to tell me you wouldn't be home again for God knows how long!"

He groaned and rolled his eyes at her, a trait that had regrettably passed down to their son. "It's for work. I can't help it. I don't know what you don't get about this. I'm going and I'll be back eventually. Don't worry about it."

She didn't retort right away, so he turned his attention from her back to his work. He was flipping through papers already and she knew that anything she said now would go right over his head as her pointless worrying. Her husband was very good at tuning things out when he didn't want to hear them.

So, rather than continue their regrettably familiar sounding argument, she spun quickly on her heel with a huff and stormed out of the room so her husband wouldn't see the few frustrated tears that had sprung to her eyes. Then she came face to face with Greg's room and gasped when she saw that the door had been left open an inch. It was one of her absolute worst fears that her son would hear his parents fighting—it would devastate him.

She poked her head quietly into the room and let out a sigh of relief when she saw him already fast asleep in his bed. She hovered for a moment before tip toeing into the room to sit on the edge of his mattress. She watched the steady rise and fall of his chest and gently ran her fingers through his hair. He was grinning to himself even in his sleep, completely oblivious to what had been going on in the room next to him.

Even when he was unconscious Greg's smile was contagious.

* * *

"Hey Sanders," a familiar nasally voice called to him from further down the hallway. Greg groaned and ducked his head as he quickened his pace. He was hoping to reach his classroom before the other boy caught up to him but it was no use—Marty Geisman had much longer legs than he did. "Don't walk away from me while I'm trying to talk to you, Sanders."

"_What_,Marty," Greg whined, more annoyed than frightened by the bully.

"I heard you got punched in the nose for sticking your face in someone else's business yesterday after school," he sneered. "And then I heard that your _mom_ showed up and she took you to the _hospital_."

Marty's usual group of cronies snickered at the degrading way he'd spoken about Greg's mom and the bright, humiliated flush that grew on the smaller boy's face when he'd said it.

"Just leave me alone," Greg growled as he finally pushed past the bullies and sped further down the hall towards his classroom.

"Or what, Sanders," Marty called after him. "You'll cry to your _mommy_?"

The group of them laughed and started reciting over and over again the very degrading "Sanders is a momma's boy" chant.

The sound was finally drowned out when Greg entered his classroom and took his seat between his two friends, all the while muttering frustrated curses under his breath. He wasn't sure who he was angrier at—Marty Geisman for always making fun of him like he did, or his mom for embarrassing him outside of the school.

"See, Greg," a voice to his left hissed. "We _told _you it was a stupid idea."

Greg groaned and put his head in his hands. Now he was just angry with his friends for not sticking up for him in the first place.

* * *

_Phew, this chapter got pretty darn long—and it was a pain in the ass to write. Thanks for the awesome reviews the-amazing-lyndz, leaping lizards 330, and…uh…that was it. Bummer._

_Next chapter's why the rating is T, so look forward to that next Tuesday I guess. But I'm not entirely done with it yet, so any reviews or critiques would be nice to get me going—hint hint :)_


	4. Greg plays Hackey Sack

**Chapter IV: Greg plays Hackey Sack**

"Bye, Gregory," Mrs. Sanders said to the last of the trio of boys as they started to file out of the back of her van. "Have a nice day at school."

Greg barely glanced back at his mother as he grumbled something nonsensical under his breath and slammed the car door shut behind him with more force than necessary.

He was in a bad mood. A _very _bad mood, and it was all her fault. He'd been grumpy and standoffish with her all week, since Monday night when he discovered that his father wouldn't be coming home because he was away on another business trip, this time for a whole six days or maybe even more. Both of his parents knew about it, but neither had even bothered to tell their son. He was furious with both of them, but his mother got the brunt of his cold shoulder just because she was the one around all the time. And he would only be angry with his dad until the man came home with some unnecessary gift to make his son feel appreciated until the next time he disappeared again.

Greg wasn't stupid—he knew something was wrong with his family's situation. Fathers weren't supposed to not want to see their sons and then return later with a peace offering of sorts. He honestly couldn't understand why his mother did nothing about it and let his father go off like he did. And the more Greg thought about it, the angrier he became with her.

The only thing that kept him going all week was the fact that his grandparents were coming over. Nana and Papa would be waiting for him when he returned from school, and they would dote on him and make him forget about how mad he was and he would go back to being a happy, carefree kid just the way he liked to be.

But first he needed to sit through an agonizingly long day of school.

He entered his morning classroom and took his usual seat just as a moderately sized spitball whizzed past his head. He turned automatically to glare at Marty Geisman, who smirked cruelly back at him. Greg's bad mood was fueled tenfold, and he was about to open his mouth and retort scathingly when his English teacher suddenly walked into the room.

"Good morning, class," she said with a smile.

"Good morning, Miss Totteli," the students returned in unison. But one loud voice in particular overpowered the rest with an obnoxious, "good morning, Miss _Tortellini_."

Greg just rolled his eyes at the very lame nickname. Apparently Marty Geisman thought he was tough enough to pick on the teachers to their faces now. Usually he would just mock them behind their backs in other classrooms. Now it was as if he were testing their teacher, waiting to see if she would reprimand him for the quip or ignore it and continue on with her lesson.

But Miss Totteli just turned and pushed her thick glasses back up her nose as she looked over Marty with a half grin on her face. "And good morning to you as well, Mr. _Gas_man."

The class exploded with laughter at the surprisingly immature comeback. Of course Marty Geisman didn't laugh, and Greg was very pleased to see a humiliated blush on the bully's cheeks. He should have known by now that the English teacher would never let him get away with being disrespectful.

Though Greg enjoyed studying the English language about as much as he enjoyed studying the very useless French language, he liked Miss Totteli very much. She was younger and much more sociable with her students than the rest of Greg's teachers. He wasn't sure exactly how old she was, but he did know she didn't have as many grey hairs as his mother did, so she couldn't have been _that_ old.

"Alright, that's enough," she said after letting the class have their few minutes of hilarity. "Settle down." They did so she began their lesson while Greg continued to grin stupidly to himself over the look on Marty Geisman's face.

* * *

It was Thursday—Chess Day. Or it was usually Chess Day. The eighth grade teacher at Greg's school, an older gentleman named Mr. Shelley, had started an innocent little after school chess gathering with his students and encouraged children from every grade to join. Greg's friends did not care for chess, probably because Greg could always beat them in just a few carefully calculated moves. Greg loved chess. It was a game he could actually win at, even when he played the older kids at his school. Things like sports and spelling bee competitions had never been Greg's forte, but put him in front of a black and white checkered board with a neat row of little chess figures and he was all powerful. God like, even.

Except for today. Mr. Shelley had to cancel the after school Chess Day after only a half an hour to go to a doctor's appointment. While Greg had known this ahead of time, he had neglected to tell his mother about it, mostly because of the speaking embargo he'd had on her since Monday. But now he regretted not telling her, because she wouldn't be picking him up for another whole hour when his chess games usually ended. By the time he'd remembered that he'd forgotten, most of the other students and teachers had gone, leaving him to stand alone on the steps in front of the school feeling very stupid.

He followed his usual after school path and half hoped to see his friends sitting in their usual spot while they waited for their late ride to show up. Instead, there was a pair of eighth grade girls sitting beneath the tree, giggling about something while they played with each other's hair.

With a disappointed and disgusted groan Greg turned away before the girls could see him. He walked slowly back towards the school and strolled along the perimeter, his hands shoved in his pockets while he glanced around, hoping to see a familiar face. He didn't, so he continued around the corner of the school and out of sight of the few people still hanging around in the front. As much as he didn't like to be by himself, Greg certainly didn't want to be seen waiting around after school by himself. That would probably label him an even bigger loser than he already was.

He wandered further down the shadowed side yard of the school that dead ended in a dumpster infested alcove. And on the other side of the field was a very familiar chain link fence. Greg stared at it and recalled the nosebleed that he'd received there more than a week earlier. He vaguely wondered if any of his blood was still lingering in the grass there, and then he wondered if he should go investigate.

He'd always wanted to see a drop of his own blood under his amateur microscope to get even a fleeting glimpse of his own DNA, but could never bring himself to draw even tiny bit of blood. He wasn't exactly squeamish when it came to blood, but he enjoyed bleeding about as much as the next sane guy.

He was just starting in that direction when he heard the sounds of hushed voices. He glanced back, towards the far end of the fence, just in time to see a familiar trio hop over the chain links. The public school kids hadn't been around here since the nosebleed incident, probably so they wouldn't get in trouble for it. But now that they were back an irrationally fearful tremor ran down Greg's spine. He swallowed hard and made a left turn in the hopes that they wouldn't notice him standing there, alone, in the middle of the field. Regrettably he wasn't quick enough, as one of the boys called out to him the second he started walking away.

"Hey, _twerp_," a gruff voice called. "I've been meaning to talk to you…"

Greg groaned at the familiar, belittling nickname as he continued shuffling hurriedly forward without even bothering to look back at the bigger boy.

"I'm talkin' to you, dip shit!"

Greg gasped when he felt a large hand fall on his shoulder and force him to turn and look up at the pack of grungy, pimple faced teenagers. Terror crept into his system, but he managed to keep it hidden, as showing outward displays of fear was not the Greg Sanders way.

"_What_?" he whined as he came face to face with the boy whose fist had caused Greg's very unfortunate nosebleed.

"You shouldn't have fucking tattled on us, _twerp_," the bully said menacingly as his cronies started to close a tight circle around him and Greg.

Greg looked up at them in confusion and shock at the boy's harsh language. "T-tattled," he squeaked. "Tattled for what?"

"You told on us for hitting you last week, and then for smoking on school property," the bully growled as he leaned in and pointed an accusing finger at his prey. "We got in school suspension for a whole week because of you, you little bitch."

Greg wanted to comment how they deserved to get an even longer and much more degrading punishment, but wisely didn't as the circle's close proximity was making him very nervous. He just managed to keep his voice steady enough to say, "no I didn't! I'm not a snitch—I didn't tell on you, I swear!"

"Well somebody did," the larger boy spat. He showed his distaste for the response by flicking the half burnt cigarette he'd been sucking on at Greg's chest. Greg winced in surprise and quickly brushed the cinders away from his jacket before they could catch fire. He tried to turn and run away from them, but was yanked roughly back by the hand that was still tightly gripping his shoulder from behind.

The leader of the trio laughed at Greg's futile effort to escape. "Where you goin', huh?" he chuckled. "We thought you wanted to hang with us…how about we play a game together?"

Greg felt himself quivering ever so slightly at the malicious joy in the other boy's tone. "A…a g-game?"

The bully's smile grew impossibly wider. "Yeah…a game. You know what a hacky sack is, _twerp_?"

"It-it's a little b-ball…thingy…" he mumbled. He found himself looking desperately for some kind of help, but even the girls beneath the tree had gone and there was no one else around to see or hear Greg in his plight.

"Well my hacky sack is stuck on my school's roof, so it looks like you're going to have to take its place."

Without warning he suddenly shoved Greg backwards into one of the other boys, who in turn shoved Greg back to him. The smaller boy was tossed around between the trio, back and forth while they laughed down on him. It didn't really hurt, it was just terribly disorienting to not be able to regain his balance and footing before he was pushed again. Greg couldn't even cry out—the fear and confusion kept his voice at a low, pathetic whimper as he insisted over and over that he hadn't told on them. But apparently they couldn't hear him over their laughter.

After a few humiliating minutes that felt like hours to Greg, he was shoved one last time in the back and caught at the lapel of his jacket by the leader, who had already grown tired of their little game. Just as Greg was regaining his footing, the larger boy pulled back his free fist and struck Greg hard in the side of the face just below his eye. The blow was so sudden and so painful that he actually saw disorienting stars dance in front of his eyes. The grip on his shirt was released and it took a Greg a second to realize that he was tipping over.

He fell backwards again into their little circle, only now there were no bodies there to break his fall as the other two chuckling bullies stepped out of the way. Greg cried out in surprise as he tripped over his own feet and toppled backwards, his arms swinging around ridiculously as he tried to break his fall. And break his fall he did, as one of his hands hit the ground hard and gave out as his arm buckled beneath the rest of his body with a crack that was loud enough to shock the bullies into silence.

Pain shot through the limb, effectively drowning out the pounding ache in Greg's cheek as he crumpled to the ground. Instinctively Greg turned to his side as he cradled his stinging right wrist to his chest. He opened his mouth to yell, or cry, or something but couldn't make a sound as a meaty hand smothered Greg's mouth and shoved him back down in the dirt.

"Ooh, don't even think about it, you little shit," the bully hissed. "There's no way I'm gettin' in trouble 'cause of you again."

Greg whimpered behind the boy's palm and tried in vain to push the grip away from his face despite the agonizing pain in his arm. He couldn't even kick his legs out because the heavier boy was sitting on him. It wasn't long before the claustrophobia, the pain, and the fear became too much for young Greg as he felt himself shudder with muffled sobs while tears streamed down his cheeks onto the bully's hand.

"Oh look," one of them cruelly mocked. "You made the wittle twerpie _cwy_…"

All three of them laughed at that as the one grabbing Greg stifled his face even harder, until Greg was pretty sure he could taste blood from where his sharp, metal braces were cutting into the insides of his lips.

"What do we do now?" the third whispered after the laughter had died down. "If someone sees him like this, we'll get in trouble again."

A thoughtful silence fell over them for a long few minutes and all that could be heard was Greg's muffled, panicked breathing. The biggest of the three looked up from his victim and scanned the shaded school yard, his smile growing when he spied the solution to their problem.

"Alrighty, boys," their leader said as he hoisted Greg up off the ground by the mouth. He wrapped his free arm around the smaller boy's chest, not even caring that he jostled the fractured limb as he pinned the small arms to their sides. "Let's take out the trash."

Greg moaned and shuddered as the bully dragged him bodily towards the back of his school where a lone dumpster sat in a dark corner of the building. Greg and his classmates never ventured this far back in the school's grounds. Now, considering his situation, he couldn't help but think that it was the perfect isolated spot for a body dump.

"In ya go," one of the bullies said as he lifted the heavy lid of the dirty, green dumpster.

The boys were tall, but still too short to reach over the edge of the deep box. Lucky for them there was a sturdy crate lying in front of it for such an emergency. The bully dragging Greg along took an unsteady step upwards, and Greg used the opportunity to kick against the dumpster, causing the larger boy to stumble back with a curse. Greg might have been free with another thrash, had it not been for the third bully who suddenly wrapped his arms around Greg's flailing legs.

Together the two lifted him up and over the edge of the dumpster while the third held the lid open. Greg struggled as valiantly as he could while he was shoved backwards into the deep, half filled dumpster. He was just scrambling to his feet in the garbage when the largest bully grabbed him again, this time by the collar of his shirt so he could shove the sixth grader backwards head first down the slope of trash. Greg cried out as his back arched painfully on top of his already sore body and threatened to break him in half completely.

"Shut the hell up!" the big boy growled. In a split second he'd snatched a fistful of garbage and shoved it into Greg's open mouth. Greg choked and sputtered but could not dislodge the awful tasting substances from between his teeth.

"See what happens when you fuck with me, twerp?" the bully hissed. "You tell on us again and I'll be sure to break your other arm next time, if I don't just kill you first. Got it?!"

He shook Greg hard to make sure the point got across, and Greg could only respond with a stifled whimper. He'd never been more scared in his entire life, and there was no doubt in his mind that the boy would follow through with his threats. Compared to these bullies, Marty Geisman might have been Greg's best friend.

"Good," he said with a cruel grin. "And don't you forget it, ass wipe."

With that he finally released his grip on Greg's shirt and disappeared over the lip of the dumpster. Greg flinched a moment later when the heavy lid fell with a slam, leaving him alone in the smelly darkness as the sounds of laugher moved further and further away from him. He let out a terrified, sniffling breath and didn't move until he was sure they were really gone. Eventually he stopped shaking enough to reach his good arm up and pull the remnants of the day's garbage out of his mouth. A brown paper bag, fruit snack wrappers, bread crusts, a greasy banana peel… It made Greg nauseous to think of the disgusting substances that had been shoved in there and were probably still stuck in his braces.

He could just see the outline of sunlight above him which gave him a brief glimmer of hope that he would be able to get out of this on his own and not have to worry about the public school bullies again. He could clean himself up before his mom ever saw, and she wouldn't suspect a thing. He would just have to hide his arm injury until he could fake an accident of some sort.

Greg let out one last shuddering breath and wiped away his tears as he mustered the little bit of strength he had for an escape. He kept his aching wrist tucked against his chest while his good hand reached behind his head to push off of the wall of the dumpster. If he could just sit upright, he would be able to push open the lid no problem and carefully climb out.

But what he didn't count on was the slime that coated the interior wall. The second he started pushing himself up his hand slipped and he fell back again as the back of his head hit the metal with a reverberating bang. He actually sank backwards into the muck further than he was when he began, and now his head hurt along with his wrist and the rest of his body. All the plans he'd made for after his escape were instantly dashed—all he could think now was that he was going to die alone and scared in a rank dumpster. He didn't even try to move again as he gave in to his fate and sobbed pathetically like the _wittle twerpie _that he undeniably was.

* * *

_Now I'm sure if this kind of thing had really happened, Greg probably wouldn't be too keen on dumpster diving…_

_Thanks a bunch happyharper13, the-amazing-lyndz, laura, InkStainedBlood, and JauntyChick for the reviews. It means a lot, really :)_


	5. Greg is A Okay

**Chapter V: Greg is A-Okay**

Miss Totteli hated after school detention duty. But the English teacher had no choice as today was her day to supervise the trouble makers of the school. All she wanted to do was go home to her fiancé, but instead she had to sit an extra hour and pass the time filling in a crossword puzzle while the future delinquents of America were punished by silence and boredom.

This was a prestigious private school, but that didn't mean it wasn't susceptible to its share of trouble makers. She was only thankful that at her school the majority of the children actually cared about their studies—or at least their parents did. She'd heard horror stories from the teachers who taught at the nearby public school. The kids over there were just brutal to each other.

She filled in the last letters of her puzzle and gulped down what was left of her lukewarm coffee. The last twenty minutes of the detention were spent with her checking the clock as frequently as the kids did until finally their time together was finally up.

"Alright," she said as she rose from her chair to stretch. "You're free to go. I hope you learned your lesson and won't screw around again. Because if I see you in here again next week I'll be sure to give you busy work. Lots and lots of busy work."

The two boys before her nodded earnestly and dashed out of the room towards the freedom of the school's front doors. Miss Totteli knew the feeling, as she too was ecstatic to be finally going home.

She gathered up her newspaper and empty Styrofoam cup with a sigh that quickly turned into an annoyed groan when she saw the state of the garbage can in the corner of her classroom. The canister was overflowing with crumpled papers, plastic wrappers, and various other pieces of trash that had been gathering for the past few days.

It was becoming a serious problem in their school, as the janitors rarely did their jobs to their fullest. They were supposed to pick up the trash in every room every day, but now the teachers were lucky if their classrooms were cleaned once a week. Some of the faculty put up with it, but not Miss Totteli—she was, undeniably, a clean freak. And if the janitorial people weren't doing their jobs, then she had no choice but to do it for them.

She wrinkled her nose at the knee high plastic bin and hefted it up gingerly in two hands, being sure to keep it an arm's length away from her as she carried it out of the room and towards the back exit of the school. She only hoped that the dumpsters out there weren't overflowing like their smaller counterparts, but with all the garbage that was left daily in the school she honestly doubted that anything had been taken to the dumpsters all week.

Needless to say, she was very surprised to find that the dumpster she opened was not in fact empty.

* * *

Mrs. Sanders didn't care that she was speeding. She didn't care that she was running red lights and zooming around other cars by driving on the roads' shoulders. The only thing she cared about was getting to her destination as quickly as humanly possible. Her worst fear had come true when she received a call that her son, her only baby boy, was in the Emergency Room without her. She was just getting ready to go and pick him up from school anyway when the phone rang. She didn't hear many details about what had happened or how seriously Greg was hurt, because as soon as she'd heard the word "hospital" she was out the door. Within seconds she was backing out of the driveway and speeding relentlessly into town.

"Where is my son?!" she gasped as she entered the hospital and sped to the front desk, looking around in vain for her boy in the waiting room. "Where is Gregory Sanders?!"

The hospital workers and other patients started at her with sympathy, and a long few moments passed before anyone stepped forward with any information. It was a young woman with thick glasses that Mrs. Sanders vaguely remembered as being her son's English teacher.

"Mrs. Sanders," she started softly. "I…I'm sorry… Greg was hurt after school today. I found him in…in the dumpster, and—"

"The dumpster?!" the concerned mother shrieked. "He was just supposed to be playing chess!"

"I know," the teacher said gently. "They finished early and Greg went to wait outside by himself—"

"Where is he?" Mrs. Sanders asked again desperately, not immediately caring about what had happened. "I need to see him!"

Before she could get any more hysterical and panicked with worry than she already was, a man in scrubs approached them. Mrs. Sanders realized numbly that he was the same doctor they'd seen over a week ago for Greg's nosebleed—she couldn't remember his name, but she recognized his youthful face.

"Mrs. Sanders…" he started with a pitying look similar to the teacher's that made her blood run cold.

"Where is my baby? Is he okay? Can I see him?"

The doctor nodded stiffly. "He's going to be okay. Please follow me."

He led her away from the worried looking teacher, through the hospital halls, and past the small examination room that she'd been in more than a week earlier. She couldn't help but think that the deeper into the building they went, the worse off her son would be. She could see it now…her little boy on a starchy bed with machines beeping around him while he lay motionless—comatose, even—bloodied, broken, beaten…or worse. She honestly didn't know what she would do if she lost her only child.

The doctor stopped in front of a swinging door and pushed it open for her, revealing a tiled room that despite the bright iridescent lights felt very cold and dark to her. It was frightening almost, how the chills ran up and down her spine before she'd even turned her attention to a lone gurney in the center of the room and the small figure that sat upon it.

The boy looked especially frail wearing a baggy hospital gown over his navy pants while his still Chuck Taylor clad feet dangled limply in front of him. He was hunched over slightly with his arms hugging himself protectively. He raised his head slowly when he heard a commotion at the door, and she gasped when she saw the bright shiner on his cheek in contrast to his pale face.

Greg sniffled as fresh tears started to form in his already blood shot eyes. "M-mom…" he whimpered through quivering lips. "M-mom, 'm s-s-sorry…"

"Oh, Gregory," she whispered as she quickly crossed the tiled room to his side. She put a gentle hand on his cheek and looked him over, taking in the bruise on his face again before noticing the bulky splint wrapped around the arm that he cradled to his chest. She was immensely grateful it hadn't been any worse, but it still broke her heart to see him so hurt and scared. "My poor baby…"

She sank down next to him on the gurney and carefully put an arm around his shoulders. He didn't flinch or react at all besides his sobbing, so she gently eased him sideways until he was leaning against her with his head resting against the crook of her neck. He curled up a little against her, his free arm grasping her sweater in a tight fist. She held him closer and tenderly rocked back and forth while he cried.

"It's okay," she cooed softly. "It's okay, sweetheart. Mommy's here."

They were like this for a long while before she remembered that the doctor was in the room. She reluctantly took her eyes from her son to address the doctor, who was waiting patiently to give her the diagnosis.

"Mrs. Sanders," he said softly over Greg's muffled crying. "He's going to be alright. He's got a few minor bruises, and his right wrist only sustained minor fractures. We'll be able to set it properly once the x-rays come back. I gave him something for the pain—I think he's just upset."

"Do you know what happened to him?" she asked shakily.

The doctor shook his head. "He hasn't said much. I only know what his teacher knows. Hopefully he'll be able to tell you more. We've alerted the authorities, too, so if you could relay his story to them that would be very helpful."

"Authorities?"

"Whether it was a simple school yard prank or not, someone is responsible for hurting your son, Mrs. Sanders."

She nodded her understanding while unconsciously holding Greg even tighter, as if that could protect him from what had already happened.

The doctor dismissed himself after that, leaving mother and son alone in the examination room. Soon Greg's sobs had slowed and he sat limply from exhaustion in his mother's comforting arms.

"What happened, Gregory?" she asked gently. "Who hurt you?"

He surprised her when he suddenly turned his head up to stare at her through wide, teary eyes. "Th-they said I told on them, but I didn't, really!" he blurted in a shaky, high pitched voice.

"Slow down, sweetie," she said while her hand rubbed comforting circles into her son's back. "Who? Was it those boys from last week?"

Greg nodded with a sniffle. "They got in t-trouble, and they said I told on them…but I didn't!"

And suddenly it dawned on her why he had been hurt again. Greg wasn't responsible for getting the bullies in trouble, _she _was. She was, after all, the one who insistently called the school's principal after the nosebleed incident until he finally did something about it. Now the boys were wrongfully taking their revenge out on Greg who was only guilty of having an overly protective mother.

She was quiet for a long time, feeling sick with guilt. The sudden silence unnerved Greg, who spoke up again in his wobbly voice. "It wasn't my fault…"

"I know, Gregory," she finally croaked. "It was mine."

He blinked up at her, obviously not quite grasping what she was trying to tell him. She looked at his pale, wounded face and didn't have the heart to explain it to him. Instead she hugged him close as a few guilty tears slipped down her cheeks.

"I'm so sorry, Gregory," she whispered. "I'm sorry for everything. I'm sorry you were hurt again. And I'm sorry that your father…that I didn't tell you he was going away again. I'm just…I'm sorry…"

And suddenly she was the one crying while Greg consoled her. "It's okay, mom," he murmured fearlessly, even if he wasn't quite grasping what she was saying to him. "I forgive you."

* * *

Hours later, after the X-rays were examined and a proper cast was made around the corrected bones in Greg's fractured wrist, Mrs. Sanders was finally able to take her son home. She helped him back into his school uniform and fastened the few buttons on his shirt for him while the doctor explained the responsibilities that came with wearing a cast for an extended period of time. Greg listened intently, the tears and fear almost completely gone from his eyes as he absorbed the man's every word.

"We'll schedule a few follow up appointments, just to make sure the bones are healing correctly," the doctor explained. He passed her a bottle of prescription pain killers with clear instructions on them.

"Thank you," Mrs. Sanders said. "For everything."

"No problem. I'll be in touch, with you and the public school. The kids who did this are going to be punished, and don't you worry," he said specifically to Greg. "We'll make sure nothing like this ever happens again."

Greg nodded his thanks and was soon shuffling out of the examination room while his mother kept her comforting arm around his shoulders. He was staring intensely at the ground through heavily lidded eyes and was so exhausted that he barely even noticed that his mother had stopped walking.

"Hey, Greg," a gentle, familiar voice said.

Greg pulled his face away from his mother's side and blinked sleepily at his English teacher as she crouched down in front of him with a warm smile on her face. He cleared his throat and felt a slight blush rise in his cheeks as he recalled how embarrassing it was to have her find him crying in the dumpster outside of school.

"Hi, Miss Totteli," he finally said in a horse whisper.

"I'm glad you're going to be okay," the teacher said genuinely. "I was very worried about you."

"Thank you," Greg's mother said when he couldn't quite find his voice to say anything. "It means a lot that you stayed this late."

"Sure, no problem," the younger woman answered before turning back to her student with a sympathetic expression. "And Greg, I think it'll be alright if we don't see you in school tomorrow. Just feel better, okay?"

Normally the boy would have been ecstatic to be given a day off from school by his teacher, but he was too exhausted to care. "Okay," he muttered. "Thanks, Miss Totteli."

She let a comforting hand fall on Greg's shoulder, as though to reassure him that he really would be okay, before straightening up again to say her farewell to Mrs. Sanders. Then they were finally leaving the hospital, with Greg clinging to his mother's waist the entire way to her minivan. There he was given the privilege of sitting in the front seat, thought it felt like a hollow victory, especially when his mother had to buckle his seat belt for him.

"Mom?" Greg said so softly that she almost didn't hear him as she pulled out of the hospital's parking lot.

"Yes, Gregory?"

"You…you're not gonna tell dad, are you?"

She glanced away from the road to see her son's face illuminated by passing streetlights. He looked apprehensive, but more out of embarrassment than fear of getting in trouble. Sadly she knew that Greg knew that his father wouldn't care anyway. No, she could see in Greg's face that he didn't want his father to think of him as weak and a victim to the larger children's bullying. The least she could do was respect his wishes—something she knew his father would never do for him.

"No, Gregory," she said gently. "Dad doesn't have to know what happened after school today. When he comes home, we'll just tell him you fell and hurt your arm. Okay?"

She sent him a reassuring smile that he did not return. But he did nod and the nervous tension in his expression eased up a bit. Now he just looked tired.

"Would you like to get something for dinner on the way home? I could pick up a pizza…"

She thought that would cheer him up, as the boy loved ordering from the local pizzeria, but saw him shake his head out of the corner of his eye.

"We could get something else if you like…"

"Not hungry," he mumbled.

She realized that her own appetite was also gone due to the hectic afternoon. "Me either," she said with a heavy sigh.

They spent the rest of the ride in comfortable silence until they arrived in front of their house. Mrs. Sanders pulled her van into the driveway, killed the engine, and moved around the front of the car towards the passenger side to help Greg out of his seat, but didn't even notice the two figures waiting on her dark porch. A tall, gangly man and a petite woman sat together on a massive suitcase while they waited somewhat impatiently for their daughter's return.

"Finally," Papa Olaff's deep, thickly accented voice commented. "The wanderers return."

"You see, I tell you," Nana Olaff said to her husband. "She forgets she invites us to her home."

Mrs. Sanders spun her head around in surprise at the voices. "Mama, Papa," she exclaimed when she realized who was sitting there. "I am _so _sorry. I didn't forget, really. I was just—"

But she was unable to finish explaining herself as she'd finally helped Greg out of the car and onto his feet. At the sight of his slung arm and sad, bruised face, the elderly couple leapt to their feet and rushed towards him. "What happen to our Gregers?" they both asked in concern.

"He…he had a…an _accident _at school today," Greg's mother explained.

The grandmother approached them first and didn't have to lean down far to gather her grandson into a warm hug. "Poor thing," she said as she gave Greg a big kiss on his cheek.

When Papa Olaff approached he stared down at his young grandson, and for a moment Greg feared the cold look on the older man's face. It was like his deep, blue eyes could bore right into Greg and see that this was no accident.

But instead of interrogating the boy or waiting for him to explain what had really happened, the man's wizened face softened as he reached down to lift Greg into a careful and comforting embrace, always wary of his strapped arm.

"My poor little Gregers," he said thickly.

Greg wrapped his free arm around his grandfather's neck and let the older man take him to the house. Mrs. Sanders watched as her father carried his grandson carefully through the front door and towards the living room. She hefted her parents' suitcase inside and hovered there in the foyer while she watched them go. Just before they moved out of sight she saw Papa Olaff say something quietly to Greg, and suddenly a familiar, goofy grin broke on the boy's face from where it was poked out over his grandfather's shoulder.

It surprised her, that something as simple as a few words—whatever they may have been—could make him smile after everything that had happened to him today. But that's just the way her parents were…calm, supportive, and loving like everyone's parents should be. Pondering on it now, she couldn't help but think it was a shame that Greg was not so lucky to have her and his father as parents.

"Gregers is going to be all right," a quiet voice said. Mrs. Sanders blinked out of her thoughts and noticed for the first time that her mother had been standing there, watching her while she watched her son. "You worry too much."

"I…I was so scared," she responded in a quivering voice. "If he was—"

"He was not," Nana Olaff interjected. "Trust me when I tell you Gregers will be all right."

"But what if he's not all right?" Mrs. Sanders asked her mother desperately. "How can you be so sure something like this won't happen to him again?"

The older woman grinned and pointed a wrinkled finger to her own temple. "I will _always _know."

And just like Papa Olaff's words brought a smile to Greg's distraught face, Nana Olaff's caused her daughter to grin despite her teary eyes. Mrs. Sanders even laughed a little at the ridiculousness of her mother's implication. Greg was the only one who truly believed his grandmother was psychic—the rest of the family had their doubts.

But her words were enough, and with her parents around Mrs. Sanders felt as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She brushed the few lingering tears from her eyes and walked with her mother towards the living room where her father was sitting on his favorite chair with Greg on his knee.

"Mom, mom look what Papa Olaff gave me," Greg squeaked excitedly when she came into the room. He was holding up a bright, shiny coin for her to see, but all she noticed was the happy smile on his face. She leaned down to press a long kiss to his forehead as she silently thanked the higher powers that her son was okay.

"That's lovely, sweetheart," she said with a grin as she perched herself on the arm of the chair. "What is it?"

END.

* * *

_First off I wanna apologize for missing the last Tuesday update—last week I was craaazy busy, and then I was gonna upload over the weekend but I couldn't log in for some strange reason…_

_Anywho, thanks happyharper13, the-amazing-lyndz, xdannyx, laura, InkStainedBlood, and Bulls Dog for reviewing last chapter, and thanks in advanced to anybody who reviews this chapter. And thanks everybody for reading my little story in the first place—I know I could totally drag it out longer, but I never really intended to go further than this and quite frankly I just don't want to. I always like seeing the endings to things I start :)_


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